


Les Heures

by FLWhite



Series: mes fils stupides [3]
Category: SKAM (France)
Genre: Angst, Epistolary, Heavy Angst, M/M, Mental Health Issues, My apologies to Virginia Woolf, Stream of Consciousness, Suicidal Ideation, Texting, now officially canon divergent, pure unadulterated angst, self-harm ideation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-16
Updated: 2019-03-16
Packaged: 2019-11-19 05:00:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18131276
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FLWhite/pseuds/FLWhite
Summary: Opening his eyes will also bring him back into the ceaseless flow of time, to the world, to the light. The light is fighting to get him: behind his lids, he sees a sea of orange-red. He is afraid of the light.*they just let me have my phone back and theyre walking me to the shower and to the bathroom and its not as bad as the worst time but it feels worse lucas it feels much much much worse*Eliott composes a series of unsent text messages in the aftermath of E8.





	Les Heures

**Author's Note:**

> My love to anyone struggling with depression, anxiety, thoughts of self-harm, or dark feelings of any kind. Please know that you are worthy of feeling better, and try to talk with someone. 
> 
> Here's a list of hotlines/chats in the USA, Canada, East and South Asia, and Western Europe: https://thelifelinecanada.ca/help/call/  
> *  
> This is basically un-proofread. Apologies for all inevitable infelicities and in case of subsequently revealed canon divergence.  
> And evidently the character limit for Eliott's mobile carrier is very high, okay? ;) They want to enable youthful romance.

**Hours | Les Heures  
**

*****

He is afraid to open his eyes when he wakes. He feels certain that his eyelids won't work, anyway. They feel crusted with the dust of centuries, as does his mouth. Opening his eyes will also bring him back into the ceaseless flow of time, to the world, to the light. The light is fighting to get him: behind his lids, he sees a sea of orange-red. He is afraid of the light.

So he lies very still, making himself small, folding his legs tightly against his belly, curling his arms around his chest, pressing the pads of his fingers into the meat of his shoulders, and he keeps his eyes closed.

The sheets are stiff against his sticky skin. He's sweating into a pair of sweatpants and a long-sleeved shirt. There is no denying where he is, but if he keeps his eyes shut he won't have to see it, yet. The hospital. Again.

He can hear voices: his mother's, thin and weary. His father's, burred with fatigue. A faint blue-green thread of anticipation dances brightly in the orange field of his vision. He thinks before he can stop himself: _Lucas_? But it's Lucille's voice, low and hard, like knuckles in his gut.

 

_dear lucas the sky is blue today and there are almost no clouds the sun is really bright too bright for me actually_

_i have to turn away i wonder if you are outside like we were before together under a tree_

_a big tree the grass wetting your jeans and the wind catching your hair and you falling asleep_

_i wonder if you ate eggs for breakfast or muffins theyve got only shit food here_

_bland shit, tastes worse than dirt because it tastes like nothing it tastes like black holes it tastes like the end of time_

_i know that ill never see you again because i was too fucking scared_

_lucas im still scared they just let me have my phone back and theyre walking me to the shower and to the bathroom_

_and its not as bad as the worst time but it feels worse lucas it feels much much much worse_

_because i knew it was going to happen lucas_

_i knew i was going to ruin this ruin us ruin everything_

_i always have and im sure i always will but also i love you_

*

They let him go after one more night in the hospital. Sunday. He descends the broad steps with sunken middles to the cab, one parent on each arm, to the distant clamor of churchbells. He descends at tragic speed, like a bride recently jilted. His mouth feels as dry as though he had been chewing wads of paper.

During the ride home, he nods and shakes his head but otherwise says nothing. His eyes do function; the world slides past the car windows, another pleasant day, but it's still too bright for him. He wants to close his eyes, but his mother, beside him, lays her hand carefully on his cheek and whispers, "No, darling," so he forces himself to squint into the searing light until the tears come.

At home, the familiar couch accepts his weary body. He feels imprinted upon it. Neither parent forces him to talk. He knows the talking will come later, though. He is allowed to shut his eyes, a boon, because the sight of the piano and the drawings tacked over it, the record player, the chair where Lucas sat, they are all there, silently jeering, speeding the low churn of nausea in his belly.

He thumbs at his phone. He stops reading his previous message halfway through, at the "i know that ill never see you again," and deletes it. Then he hefts the phone. He wants to throw it out the window, stomp it into the floor, see it shatter. But he is too tired. That thin blue thread that is Lucas won't leave him; it blinks like the cursor on his screen. Taunting.

_dear lucas i don't think you'll read this._

_probably you'll delete this as soon as you see it or probably you've just blocked me._

_it's all right it's my fault. when I said that it was going too fast before that was also my fault._

_i really don't know what else i can tell you except that i guess i can't stop thinking about you._

_maybe it'll go away. i keep thinking about how you looked in the foyer at first when i first went in,_

_and you knew i was coming and i could see you shaking a little but_

_your face was so brave and so beautiful like a painting of a young soldier or a sad god._

_you were so angry i could see all your quills standing on end catching the sun_

_and what i really wanted to do was to put my arms around you because even if your quills were up_

_even if you wanted to hurt me at least the hurting would be a real thing_

_a thing that makes me remember myself and makes my stupid fucking useless brain stop spinning and lie still._

_i thought maybe i could smooth them down lucas i thought_

_because i was blinded by the sun in you that i could take you and_

_make you believe in me and believe in yourself and_

_give me the light of your smile and it would be so warm and so good and i would just be with you_

_like that_

_forever forever forever foreve_ r

 

He highlights the entire text message. After a moment's pause, he deletes it. His father is asking if he is hungry. He shakes his head. They insist on just a bite.

*

It is a Monday. They've dosed him high this time; it's making him extra dizzy. After he rises—slowly—he pads to the bathroom to brush his teeth, bringing his phone with him. His father is staying home today; he smells, with a stab of queasiness, eggs cooking in the kitchen. He begins typing in the bathroom and continues after he emerges; his father makes no comment.

_dear Lucas, i wonder if you are at school today. i hope so._

_i hope you are okay. i hope you are not throwing away your lunch._

_i hope your friends are making you laugh. they are good friends. i hope you are all laughing at the crazy asshole._

_the crazy asshole who didn't deserve you. i hope you realize that it wouldn't have worked._

_there was no way. i hope you're not sad. i wonder if you were sad that night._

_i know she showed up, maybe she called the cops, i hope she never went to you. you must be so angry._

_she must be angry. my parents too. everybody. i really fucked everything up._

_i really did. i really did._

_i wonder if you will go to the bus stop. will you eat another number 24._

_will another guy come sit next to you. that makes me feel really bad but i'm not angry._

_i'll never be angry with you.i don't get to be angry because_

_i am the one who fucked everything up._

_i'm sorry, Lucas. i'm sorry i did this to you. i'm sorry it wasn't somebody better at the bus stop._

_i hope you will find somebody better, Lucas. i'm sure you will_.

 

He turns the phone face-down on the dining-room table, walks carefully once more to the bathroom, and vomits up the eggs he'd just dutifully forked into his mouth.

*

A long time ago he had downloaded a Daily Quotations app, or more likely Lucille had put it on his phone. It's her kind of shit. Today the quotation stings his eyes like venom; he flicks away the notification banner, but it is too late: "If you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people."

He covers his face with a pillow so that he can sob in peace. The stifling dampness is disgusting, but by the time the tears stop, it is no longer uncomfortable. So he's still lying that way when his mother comes to wake him; she barely holds back what would almost certainly have been a scream. Her footsteps clack in haste to his side. He shifts under the duvet, tosses his head until the pillow slides free, but he keeps his eyes closed tight, because he _wants_ her to be enraged with him, to hit him for frightening her and for ruining things, ruining her life. But all she does is put a hand on his forehead, saying his name. He hates her a little.

Almost automatically, he deletes yesterday's message, begins a new one.

 

_Dear Lucas, i hope if we ever meet again that you punch me. Hit me hard. Knock me down._

_Make me taste my own blood._

_i hope you take it out on me, the things i've made you feel._

_Maybe you don't feel them, in fact. Maybe you are fine._

_Maybe you've washed your hands of this liar. Of this cheater. Of this hideous thing hiding in the dark._

_You don't talk to you mother and your father doesn't care, you said._

_But you have kind friends to help you. To remind you of the bad things i did to you._

_That would be good. That would be best. You belong in the light, you belong in the day, among the good things._

_Not with me. Not with me. i bring only darkness and bad, sad, slimy shit._

_You don't even know the things i've done. Too many. Lying all the time._

_A few things no one knows. Lying to myself a lot too._

_You were right the first time. You don't need crazy people in your life._

_i'm just sorry i wasn't brave enough. Or smart enough._

_We could've had two weeks more if i'd been able to handle kissing you in the hallway. Two whole weeks of you shining at me._

_Can't believe i ran away when i knew it would end like this anyway. i'm sorry. Forget me._

 

He lets himself cry into the arid air of his bedroom, standing before his dresser. The tears and the soreness of his eyes are the only things that feel warm and alive in his entire body.

*

They make him go outside on Thursday. Not alone--his father walks at a remove of thirty meters behind him as he shuffles around the block. "Let's go to the park, son." He blinks sadly, trying to semaphore _please let's not_ , but a hand is clapped bracingly on his shoulder and his father says with that special false joviality his father has, or maybe all fathers learn it when their firstborns emerge, "It's such a beautiful day."

He is allowed to lie in a patch of grass in the shade of an ancient oak while his father goes to buy them something to drink and eat from a cart. The message from yesterday isn't so bad. He watches the blue cursor flicker at its end. He thinks of another passage from Woolf, once glimpsed on a web site of quotations. It is long and he remembers it imperfectly, but he taps "I shove to throw to batter down" into the search bar and finds it:

_At last I say, watching as dispassionately as I can, Now take a pull of yourself. No more of this. I shove to throw to batter down. I begin to march blindly forward. I feel obstacles go down. I say it doesn't matter. Nothing matters. I become rigid and straight, and sleep again, and half wake and feel the wave beginning and watch the light whitening and wonder how, this time, breakfast and daylight will overcome it._

He pastes this over the previous message.

They'll be making him go to school soon, he knows this. Same dance as always: a long talk at home, a two-hour family session at Adrienne's office, a two-hour session by himself. Twice-a-weeks for at least eight weeks. He should conserve his words. But he has never been good at doing what he should. He clicks on the backspace key, then holds it down.

 

_Dear Lucas,_

_It is almost a week today. Are you okay? I can't stop thinking about you.That is nothing new._

_But what is new is that I think about you lying there on the bed in the boat._

_I think about how the light was beautiful on your face, your body that I had gotten to touch one more time._

_I was wishing then and I wish now that I had thought to bring paper and a pen, to record that sight._

_But probably nothing good would have come out of it. I was so warm, I was sweating, I felt like I was falling into the Sun._

_I saw you smiling as you fell asleep again and I knew it was for me and I also knew that it would be for me for the last time._

_I tried, Lucas, I tried. I lay down beside you and tried to be quiet._

_I tried to stop thinking. I wasn't strong enough, I couldn't shove to throw to batter it down._

_I couldn't shut my own head up. I don't think you woke up when I kissed you one last time, or when I stroked your hair._

_You were so golden in the darkness. But I was too warm, I was burning, I knew that soon I would catch you on fire too._

_I had to jump, I had to get into the water before I destroyed everything._

_Then it was too cold then when I got outside, black and cold, and I was very frightened._

_I felt the hand of infinite nothingness choking me. So instead of jumping I ran, Lucas,_

_I ran away from you again, the fist was tightening on me, it turned into a mouth and I was trapped_

 

His lips part in horror as the message sends with that dumb whooshing sound. So stupid, so fucking stupid, he'd reached the character limit and kept typing so it's flying through the air now, flitting toward Lucas, a dreadful phantasmic bird; he beats the earth with a fist in rage and squeezes his eyes tight. "Eliott?" His father, returning with two bottles in one hand and a little paper box in the other, is calling. He is made to sit up, sip some citrus-flavored sparkling water though the bubbles make him want to retch.

With a last clinging bit of hope he turns his phone over, and his heart simultaneously sinks and soars; the message isn't sending. Lucas has blocked him.

He lies violently back down on the grass, ignoring his father's pleading "Eliott," and stares at the clouds. Is this contraction of his face, this tightening, this slight wetness in the outer corners of his eyes a smile? A sob? He puts the back of his hand over his eyes and shuts them for good measure, returning to that glowing orange sea behind his lids. Lucas is under this sky somewhere, too. Lucas has done one last _something_ to him, for him. In another universe, they are lying here together.

**Author's Note:**

> There will soon be light and hope and love again, mes amis, for our lads and for all of us--please, hang on!
> 
> If you feel like some trashy fluffy sexy shit as a pick-me-up, please check out the 1st and 4th works in this series. Bisous~


End file.
